The Bike

As mentioned earlier, the bike I’m riding down here is a Swift Folder.  This is not your typical, hipster, ’70s-era folder that weighs a tonne.  It’s quite a nice bike.

First let’s take a look at some photos of the naked version, so to speak (I mean no luggage, not myself!).

It’s a little unorthodox.  To begin with, the bike folds in half and sports 20″/BMX wheels.  I´ve also got some swept-back North Road style bars with brake levers attached to the ends.  The bars connect to a SoftRide suspension stem.  They don´t make these anymore.  They were around just before suspension forks became the standard front bicycle suspension.  It gives me a bit of cushion without the weight of a full suspension fork (and I don´t think they make suspension forks for 20″ wheels anyway).  The rear wheel is built around an internally geared hub.  That means that all the gear changing mechanisms are actually inside the hub, so a wire just runs from the shifter at the handlebars right into the hub.  Normally this means that you don´t need a derailleur mechanism hanging down at the back.  I do have one, though, because I have two chainrings at the front, so, presto,  my 8-speed hub becomes a 16-speed hub.  The gear shifter for the hub normally goes on the ends of your handlebars, but because I have that space occupied with brake levers I had to jerry-rig something else.  You can see it below in the “cockpit view”.  The bike also sports some homemade coroplast fenders, a la Kent Peterson.

And here are some photos of the fully loaded version.

I probably shouldn´t have taken the picture against a yellow background when one of my bike bags is yellow.

I have noticed a few drawbacks with my set-up.  First, instead of having bars that sweep back towards me, I should have some bars that point away.  I feel a little too hunched.  Different bars would stretch me out a bit, which I think would be a good thing.  Second, I think the 20″ wheels, while being pretty bulletproof, don´t roll over the rocks on the unpaved roads as well as a larger diameter wheel would.  My speed slows right down on the rough stuff.  And finally, because the bike is not specifically designed for touring, attaching all my gear onto the bike is a challenge and is never done in an optimal way.  Everything is a compromise.  Normally you would have two regular racks, one front and one rear, that you could affix some panniers onto.  No problem, easy.  With the Swift it´s not so straight forward.

Nevertheless, we ride.

Ancud (again)

Returned back to Ancud for a couple of days.  I took in another 35 km ride, this time to a quiet beachfront restaurant renowned for its oysters.

Now, to be honest, I’m not a big fan of oysters.  The first time I ever ate them I was at an office party where, combined with copious amounts of wine, the contents of my stomach wanted to get up close and personal with the party and decided to join the festivities…at the table.  A little embarrassing.  It was years before I decided to take another go at them.  Round two was ok – no food was regurgitated.  But nothing special either.  I think I’m just not a fan.  So I was going to this restaurant more out of duty than with giddy anticipation.

I bet a fan of oysters would have found them delightful.  I merely found them sort of interesting.  My conversion to the cult of the oyster must wait for another time.

Here’s a look at my platter.

The restaurant was on a beautiful calm beach, where some people were digging for shellfish.  At other times of the year you can see flamingos here.

And the 35 kms on the bike just about killed me again.

Mar Brava

While in Ancud I hopped on the bike and followed a route the hostel recommended to check out the rugged west coast of the island.  The destination was a beach called Mar Brava.  The trip was about 35 km, and it just about killed me.  It became painfully clear that I was really out of shape.

About half the distance was on unpaved road.  Unpaved roads down here are nothing like the gravel roads of Southern Ontario.  Instead of being covered in gravel they are covered in rocks that range in size between golf balls and baseballs.  This type of surface really likes to shift around under bicycle tires.  It sort of feels like you´re riding on a bunch of large marbles.

Oh, and to add to my lack of fitness and the challenging road conditions, I forgot to bring any money with me.  I departed with about 500 ml of water and a package of cookies.  That was all the nourishment for the day.  I think I was a little delerious by the end.

But there was a payoff for all this hard work.  Mar Brava was absolutely stunning. 

First there was the beautiful rolling farmland that I had to travel through to get to the coast.

 

Milk jugs were all along the side of the road waiting to be picked up.

I eventually crested a hill and saw before me a wide sandy beach with Pacific waves rolling in.

When I got to the bottom of the hill there was a narrow road which ran to the right, hugging the coast.

And then, around the corner, a rocky point that you could scamper onto to get close to the waves crashing in.  There was also another beach further along, but I was wearing Birkenstock sandals and the loose pebble surface was too difficult to walk too far on.

And the best thing: after spending over an hour exploring about 3 km of coastline I met only four people.  Most of the time I had the whole place to myself.

Shakedown Breakdown

Here I am on a 3 month long bike tour, on the other side of the world, and it doesn’t take long for me to realize the effects of breaking one of the cardinal rules of bike touring – I have not done any sort of shakedown tour.

Basically, a shakedown tour is a short trip prior to a long tour that allows you to test out all your gear under actual conditions.  If something’s not working right, or the way you’ve got things set up is wrong, it’s better that it happen on a short journey than an epic one.

So no shakedown tour.  And did I mention that I’ll be riding a brand new bike…with brand new luggage and racks?  And this bike is not your typical touring bike, but what some might consider a circus bike – it’s a folder with BMX sized wheels.  Oh, and I haven’t been on a bike (or physically active, for that matter) in at least three months.  This is going to be fun.

So I get to Santiago, unpack everything and start to load the bike up.  Well, it doesn’t take long for me to realize that something’s got to give, and it better be me and my plans.  One of the main bags I’m planning to use doesn’t attach to the racks in a sufficiently solid way and thus shimmies and shakes like an out of control bowl of jello.  Not good when riding carefully on a short distance of smooth pavement; downright dangerous when half of your planned route consists of rough dirt road.  It´s got to go.  OK, that’s about 30% of my carrying capacity eliminated, and my luggage was already bursting.  So, 30% of my gear has to get cut as well.  It can’t be clothing because I only brought the bare minimum, so out goes the camping gear.  Oh, and that part of my tour that consists of rough dirt road, that represents about half of my planned trip, absolutely needs camping gear.  All of a sudden half of why I came down here has been eliminated.  I was numb, in shock.  I wandered the streets of Santiago for a while trying to wrap my head around it and in the end couldn’t.  I went to sleep not knowing what to do.

The ability to adapt is an important skill to have in life, and it definitely comes in handy when you´re on the road.  The only thing that´s guaranteed is the fact that your plans won´t go exactly as planned.  So it was with this mindset that I awoke the next day and realized there was no way around it, my plans just had to change.  The other half of my original planned trip was to visit the island of Chiloe, off the north coast of Chilean Patagonia.  I think I would still be able to bicycle around the island without needing camping gear – distances between towns were far more manageable.

So it´s off to Chiloe – land of constant rain, potatoes, and mythological figures like El Trauco, a supremely ugly dwarf who has incredible strength, carries a tiny stone hatchet with which he can chop down trees with a single blow, and possesses such sublime lovemaking abilities that young virgins find him irresistible.  I´m not making any of this up.